Gahmen Revenue

With all the hoohaas about cab-snatchers, blog-thieves & the comments regarding the fatal accident in Buona Vista MRT Station going on in the blogging community, a change of events should take the attention elsewhere.

Although I'm a smoker myself, I had no idea there was a price increase again until yesterday. An informant (read:buddy) complained to me about a sudden $1 price hike. Damn! I've lost track how much a pack of smoke costs nowadays. But I sure know it is no longer a single digit price.

As a beginner since the tender age of 10, I vaguely remember that a pack of Marlboro softpack at that time costs $1.80 or so (correct me if I'm wrong). Now what's the price like? $11.50 or something right? That's almost a 1000% increase in the course of 19 years! I don't remember a raise in salary of that magnitude from that period of time till now. Not even close.

I think the cheapest brand of smoke right now cost at least $7 (again, correct me if I'm wrong). Not to mention that small packs of 10 sticks are no longer on sale. What was the gahmen's take on this? That stopping the sale of small packs would discourage people from smoking. Haha! What a joke! Friends of mine who used to smoke a small pack per 2 days have upgraded & increased their intake to a big pack per 2 days. So was the gahmen's decision a right move? Of course it is! Now we have same number of smokers smoking twice as much now! Bravo! That equals a 100% increase in revenue for the gahmen! A brilliant move I should say.

With effect as of 1st August 2004, our gahmen introduced gruesome graphic warnings carried on cigarette packings in what I would say as a futile attempt to discourage people from smoking. Singapore might have produced some smart-asses talents but we smokers ain't dumb either. I believe I can safely say that 99.9% of the smokers know more or less the harm & damages it does to us physically. We certainly don't need images such as a mouthful of decayed teeth, diseased organs, a limp baby & a smoker on his deathbed to remind us that.

The gahmen has already banned smoking in public transport, elevators, theaters, government offices, and air-conditioned restaurants and shopping centers. The ban also applies to queues of more than two people, such as at a taxi stand. Tobacco advertisements have been banned since the 1970s and just last year, government officials lifted a 12-year ban on chewing gum to allow the sale of nicotine gum -- to help smokers quit. (Does it really work? I sure hope so)

I've watched on TV lately that the gahmen is contemplating on banning smoking in public places such as pubs & coffeeshops. Personally, I agree with the gahmen on their move to ban smoking in public transport, elevators, theaters, air-conditioned restaurants and shopping centers. But in pubs & coffeeshops? Coffeeshops perhaps so as people do patronise them for meals. With regards to pubs, customers visit them for drinks while smokers does so for the other reason as well. There was this Irish pub which banned smoking within its premises last year in conjunction with the gahmen's campaign towards a smoke-free country. Business initially did improved but as of lately it has been so bad that the owner intends to lift the ban if sales do not rebound within the next few months. What does that signify?

Today, a friend told me that Australia sells the most expensive pack of Marlboro in the world at a staggering price of SGD$12.50. Our country is number 1 in this world for quite a few things. I can see that we'll be number 1 in another aspect as the clock ticks on (we are already so near to that benchmark so this record setting price should not take long).

So let us all be optimistic & hope that our gahmen will think otherwise & revert the price of cigarettes back to what it was in the 80's.

The basis of optimism is sheer terror -- Oscar Wilde (1854-1900)